Nearly 80 percent of Americans say they do not trust the U.S. government to do what is right, expressing the highest level of distrust in Washington in half a century, according to a public opinion survey.Only 22 percent of Americans say they trust the government “just about always” or “most of the time,” according to the Pew Research Center survey released on Sunday.

Americans’ trust in the federal government has been on a steady decline from a high of 73 percent during the Eisenhower administration in 1958, when the “trust” question was first posed in a national survey, the research center said.

Over at the HQ, Dave in Texas reminds us that the Tea Party movement remains – in spite of this news – a marginal, extremist movement peopled mostly by skinheads, Nazis, Nazi skinheads and transvestite vampire hookers from Hell.

“Labour has raised more than a trillion pounds in additional taxation since 1997. Yet, unbelievably, Gordon Brown has still managed to run up a deficit of 12.6% of GDP (Greece’s is 12%). A far lower level of taxation brought Americans out in spontaneous protest last year,” Hannan wrote for the London Telegraph.

It’s about time someone like Hannan showed up in Old Europe. Goodness knows they’ve needed a dose of fiscal sanity. Too bad it might take the utter collapse of Greece to wake up that continent.